The house sat vacant for 10 years through drought, some rain and other issues, along with becoming a sanctuary for rats. I’m sure that a 60 year old house has shifted and settled several times.
These homebuyers risked their money on basically, a “sight unseen” home with the benefits going to the original homeowners.
My FIL’s house had been flooding, under the foundation for years. The City of San Diego was doing trench work, and, (whoops!, our bad) got into some trouble confusing the water lines for several neighbors.
Originally, nothing was noticed, until there was a mold-like smell. All at once, there were plumbers trucks all over the neighborhood, on similar days. The cul de sac flooded and the different plumbers derived the same conclusion, the City screwed up. About 5 houses had to fix their foundations. The city had to redo their work, and had to work with the homeowners. It was a mess. These were all custom built homes in 1961. Messy and expensive. This happened late 90’s and the owners had money to revamp.
Your current first time homebuyers had a limited budget, and bought a decayed home, expecting a full remodel with a 99 cent Store budget. Becoming angry, at “himself” by directing anger at you, was his doing.
I feel sort of bad for the new home buyers simply because they didn’t realize the WORK involved in DIY. When we built our first home we said “oh we can paint and save money!” Our builder was “oh no you can’t” and we caved thank goodnessl Those guys had everything painted in two days so work kept going. It would never have happened.
Only thing we didn’t cave on was hiring our own carpenter who was the most meticulous guy ever. The contractor was saying “he’s slow as molasses” and complained but he ate his words later as every single sub afterward sang his praises. Tiling, flooring , EVERYBODY sang his praises and work actually was done ahead of time because everything was so square.!.
We had a young couple next door who was painting --it was months! They were working and just never got the time. A month project turned to six months. We learned from them.
But I gotta say…the wallpaper has to go. Do them a final favor and screw it up and put paint there. Save them from themselves! Need some “overspray there”!
Good point. When we used to watch a lot of HGTV (before we got Netflix and Prime), I used to roll my eyes at some of the the young couples. “Ewww…. no stainless steel appliances”. Well actually some of the older couples looking for vacation home are picky too. But at least they are not picking out their starter home.
I feel sad for the couple. I’d be very upset if I accidentally ordered the wrong color cabinet after paying more for custom. It’s a learning experience for them.
Painting is more difficult and time consuming than they realize! We are repainting a vacation rental home that is a 3/2 around 1200 sq ft, by the time we are done, it will be just over two years to get it all done. We broke it into areas, ceilings, bathrooms, certain bedrooms, etc., the last to be done is the kitchen/living area. It’s slow going when you have a real life and, when you are old, it’s kinda painful!
Painting White Dove over a cafe au lait also takes more paint than one would expect.
I remember when DH and I thought we could paint our recently renovated basement. It was just two rooms, all dry walled and mudded, and should have been straight-forward. But we had a two-year-old at the time, and two full-time jobs, and we could only do maybe two hours at night. We finally realized it would take us a couple of months to do it – versus hiring the guy and having it done in a day or two.
That was when I realized you can either spend your time (assuming you have the skill --) or you can spend your money.
My H has begun painting the outside of our house since he retired—in 2013. He’s painted the front and one side so far, so let’s call it 1/2 of the outside of our 1200 sq ft one story house painted. He refuses to allow us to hire painters but fills every nook and cranny he finds and is now re-building the window screens and frames on the side of the house he painted.
No projected timeline on when he will ever get it done but he does excellent work. He’s a perfectionist and has been buying and borrowing lots of tools to do perfect woodworking for window frames and screens.
We painted our 2 1/2 story house and a detached garage all by ourselves. It involved a lot of ladder climbing and a pre-order of a $600 platform from HD. Brushes and rollers. No Wagners. Thank goodness the siding was pre-primed hardiplank! We used the platform indoors too, to paint the master bedroom with its crazy-high ceilings and the skylight millwork - ugh!! That project had to be done in a weekend because the carpet folks were coming in. I am very proud that I finished it on time.
It takes skill and a lot of elbow grease. And the right tools (not cheap!!!) plus realistic expectations.
I think this ^^ has had an influence on expectations.
Agree w/all of the above - we are in the middle of rehabbing my parents’ house for sale and it is one of the hardest things I’ve done (and my husband has an incredibly high skill level in this area). It’s so much work, for so long. lol.
Our house has been around since the early eighties and has seen a few remodels. You can see some blemishes and rough spots here and there, especially in the refinished original oak floors which also squeak. But said floors photograph so beautifully!! Bottom line: as my father used to say, even an outhouse can look beautiful if the photo is taken from the right angle.
Well, got a phone call that I needed to meet with owners today. I went over to take an inventory of the cabinet doors and drawers that were missing and, of course, it was completely different ones from the list that the shop gave the owners😀
When I arrive they had spent the whole day meticulously putting little pieces of tape on cabinets where they felt it wasn’t perfect. Think a half a piece of sand in the corner of the cabinet under the paint
There was not a lick of paint anywhere. Instead there were piles of new trim wood where the guy was all excited about cutting and installing baseboard and new window casing.
OMG!! I had to carefully explain the sequence of events and make it very clear that they were holding things up. They blamed it on the tile guy being in the bathrooms where they need to paint. That doesn’t explain the living and kitchen ceilings still sitting there
They are going to find it very hard to move in without at least the ceilings being painted and one bathroom painted to get the vanity and toilet in. And, yes, they had a ton of stuff moved into the small bedroom
Do they plan to use this kitchen or will they preserve it as a shrine. You know what I mean. Even with the most care, these cabinets will get little dings over time. Bigger than the ones you are talking about.
So the priority for them was to find imperfections in the rushed cabinets? They didn’t have either the time or the budget for cabinets and really didn’t seem to realize that everything is backed up in production. The logical step was for them to put thousands of pieces of tape everywhere to make sure errors are noted. The disintegrating wallpaper isn’t an issue. Who is taking all of that crappy tape off?
They didn’t paint the living and kitchen ceilings soaked in rat urine and feces because the priority was to point out imperfections? (blame game?) Why bother to hire a professional since they already know everything?
These people are beyond help! Priorities are really screwed up.
Charge them up the wazoo for paint, since they don’t seem to understand that you wont be at their “beck and call” on their house for the year!
cb, you also need to give them a date after which you will not be available. For anything. Otherwise these people will keep dragging you back to fix things. Lie if you have to and tell them you’re moving on to another job 50 miles in the other direction.
It involved a lot of ladder climbing and a pre-order of a $600 platform from HD. Brushes and rollers. No Wagners. Thank goodness the siding was pre-primed hardiplank! We used the platform indoors too, to paint the master bedroom with its crazy-high ceilings and the skylight millwork - ugh!! That project had to be done in a weekend because the carpet folks were coming in. I am very proud that I finished it on time.
